The purpose of the Bible - looking to Christ
Are you a fan of Victor Hugo’s story Les Miserables? - I am!! I love the book, I love the musical, I love the movie! Today's lesson brought me to think of my favorite scene.
The lesson began with the first question asking us, "what is the underlying theme of the Bible?" Wow, big question! Yet, simple answer: Jesus Christ.
The Bible is complicated, overwhelming, and massive….yet at the most basic level, it’s about Christ - how God loved us so much that he sent his son to redeem us, even though we are unworthy.
Now, back to Les Miserables….my favorite scene is this: After stealing a loaf of bread to help feed his sister’s starving family, Jean Valjean (hereafter referred to as JVJ) was sentenced to 5 years hard labor. He served his sentence and extra time for trying to escape - 19yrs total, when he was freed in 1814. Jean had almost nothing when he left prison, was bitter and hard (hearted). Finally one night, with no where to go, he sought shelter in a church. The priest offered him reprieve - a meal and a bed. But JVJ woke in the night, and couldn’t help himself from stealing the Priest’s silver, which would fetch a nice price when he sold them. He takes the silver and flees. Some time later, he is caught. The gendarmes drag him like an animal back to the church, summon the priest, who will then take his silver back and thus send JVJ back into the prison system - certainly for life now. However, in a shocking change of events, the priest exclaims, “Ah! Here you are. I am glad to see you! But what is this? I had given you also the candlesticks, and you forgot them.” JVJ is speechless. The gendarmes stare in disbelief: “but monseigneur, he was running away, with this silver”...The priest says, “that is your mistake”. They leave, and there is JVJ with the priest. “My friend, the priest says, before you go, take the candlesticks…(JVJ trembles and remains speechless) my friend. you no longer belong to evil, but to good. it is your soul that i buy from you, I withdraw it from black thoughts and the spirit of perdition, and i give it to God.” That moment of pardon is my absolute favorite scene. It awes me. From this point onwards, in this epic novel, we see JVJ as he struggles to live a life worthy of this gift, a life under the grace of a forgiving, loving God....demonstrated in the actions of the priest.
Can you imagine? Someone who steals from you….and when they are brought to you for punishment/confirmation...you offer them more? it seems beyond human nature. That is because it is - that kind of grace is from God - and the priest tells JVJ just that - that he has bought his soul for good - and is giving it to God.
Just like JVJ, we do not deserve God’s grace. We try to live right, but we are human. God sent His son to us on a rescue mission. The Israelites had become so regulated and outwardly religious that there was little love in their hearts and actions. Sacrifice - the very word can be beautiful and ugly at the same time - giving something up, sacrificing something means a loss, yet the purpose is for good, to atone, to heal something. So it was with the Israelites, they needed to continually atone for their sins, again and again and again. They were so focused on the laws, that they had forgotten grace. Interestingly, Les Miserables is a story of just that - the law vs. grace & redemption.
Just when the Israelites are at their best with outwardly religion and rule following….
there is a rescue mission.
John 3:16 says…For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD: it doesn’t start with us loving him. HE loved us first. This is not the love I have for my husband, this is not the love I have for my children, the love I have for my friends, for my parents, anyone…
This is a supernatural, surpasses all understanding love. It is a love of the world and ALL of us in it. A love for the human race - all of us - me, you, our friends, families, our enemies, in means leaders of every country - good and bad, it means everyone - deserving or not.
LOVE IS GOD. GOD IS LOVE.
God loved us first:
sample of what we’ll be getting into with our next study booklet!!
1 John 4: 7-12…
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us,we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
This week’s lesson is essentially showing us the basic premise that this book is ultimately a book about Christ - from beginning to end.
Last week we looked at prophecy, and the number of prophecies fulfilled in Jesus is over 300, therefore we KNOW it was not coincidence. He was not just some guy. He was not one of many. He was Gods one and only begotten son. God became flesh in Jesus, to be with us, to live and walk among us, to feel our pain, to feel our suffering, and our joy and our challenges.
When I first became a Christian, I rarely looked into scriptures of the Old Testament. It seemed bizarre. But after studying some of it (mostly Moses) in a Bible study similar to ours, my eyes opened to see Christ everywhere. In the book of Matthew, twelve times you will find the term “fulfilled” along with a connection to the Old Testament (that it might be fulfilled, was fulfilled, etc”)
The blood system of sacrifice was finished with Jesus - He was the lamb of God. Sacrifice and substitutionary atonement were the foundation of the Old Testament and the people’s relationship with God. God is holy, we are not - we must approach him through or with something that shows our respect and due honor to him.
2 Corinthians 5:21
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
I admit I still don’t understand some aspects of the Old Testament but I take encouragement in that the New Testament is here to explain how Jesus came to complete the Old Testament scriptures - Question 5 in our study “Jesus interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.”
John 3:16 - God loves everyone - WHOEVER - for everyone, unlimited….
God knows everything about me, scary. He sees how unloveable I am. He sees my selfish thoughts. He sees me in the morning when I go to facebook instead of my faithbook. And he loves me all the same. He sees me seek happiness when I should be seeking holiness. And he loves me all the same. He sees me when I suffer - and I go off to send a text instead of remembering I am blessed. And he loves me all the same.
And for me, in this ugliness, he sacrificed his very own one and only son?
Just like the priest rendered JVJ completely dumbfounded by his grace and forgiveness, above and beyond that generosity; God has pardoned our sin, all of our faults and yuck, and given us his son, to not just give us a new life, but an abundant life:
John 10:10
“I came so that all might have life; and have it to the full”
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